This invention relates to a device to mechanically decompose a barrier which separates two or more mutually miscible ingredients and to mix the said ingredients, preferably a mixer for amalgam in capsules, the said device comprising first members to fixedly hold the said ingredients and second members to impart to the said ingredients a sufficiently rapid motion to accomplish the said barrier decomposition and mixing.
Known amalgam mixers are usually very large and clumsy, are driven electrically, vibrate powerfully and have a high noise level, as well as requiring accurate fixation of the capsule in which the mixable amalgam is located. Further, known mixers are usually placed so that the dentist is obliged to interrupt the work he is doing in order to move to the mixer, to insert an amalgam capsule and to stop the machine. Only after this can the dentist or dental nurse return to the interrupted work. When mixing of the amalgam is ready the dentist or nurse must once again interrupt what he or she is doing and walk to the mixer, remove the capsule and return to the patient. This walking back and forth repeatedly makes demands on the time not only of the dentist or nurse but also of the patient and thus costs large sums of money.
Known amalgam mixers also call for a relatively careful location and alignment and fixation of the capsule, which actions also take unnecessary and expensive time.
An object of the present invention is to provide a device which is simple and quick to use, which is quiet-running, which gives low or no self-propagating vibrations and which is small in size and thus possible to place in a suitable position in relation to the dentist and which is relatively simple and thus can be manufactured at a favourable price.
The invention is characterized in the type of device mentioned in the descriptive preamble in that the said first members comprise a closable space in which the said ingredients and said capsule respectively ar miscible and of which these and this respectively are aligned with the said second members, and in that the said second members are arranged to be started only when or after closing of the said closable space. In particular the invention, where the said second members comprise a piston and a return-fed sleeve with bottom, is characterized in that the said piston is arranged to be driven reciprocatingly largely in a rectilinear motion, in that the said return-fed sleeve with bottom is arranged to move essentially in the same motional direction as the piston and in that the said ingredients and capsule respectively are arranged placeable between the piston and the sleeve with bottom.